Elsewhere

Oops!

I like having my own domain. It gives me an identity — not only metaphorically but in actuality too. In addition to this here blog, being a geek I run my own OpenID server. There’s also my catch-all email addresses for individual websites to help me filter my inbox. For instance, emails from Facebook and Twitter can be routed in to the appropriate place.

All of this broke down at the end of January — I stupidly forgot to renew my domain. My registrar did email me several times to remind me but unfortunately I hadn’t updated my details and the alerts were sent to an old email account that I mainly use as a spam honeypot these days and they remained unread.

Initially I didn’t know what the problem was when my website wasn’t responding. The Twitter website also helpfully pointed out that their emails to me were bouncing back. Thankfully there is a notification period before domains are returned to the available pool for occasions such as this and, after some back-and-forth between my ISP and my registrar, I got to the bottom of things.